


Not Just Another Experiment

by mmmdraco



Category: 21 Jump Street (2012)
Genre: Dubious Technology, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-20
Updated: 2013-11-20
Packaged: 2018-01-02 04:14:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1052400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mmmdraco/pseuds/mmmdraco
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Jenko hurts his hand on the job, he gets stuck on desk duty. He's surprised to find that it might not suck as much as he thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Just Another Experiment

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shoemaster](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shoemaster/gifts).



Greg ran a hand through his hair and sighed. Damn this stupid day. He'd been out on duty this morning and things had been great, but then he'd had to pull his gun on a perp and, when he fired, somehow his hand had gotten caught in the trigger, tearing out a fucking chunk of his finger. It meant that until he healed, he was on desk detail. Fucking paperwork and dealing with people coming in to file complaints about their neighbors farting too loud in the middle of the night and other stupid shit. Schmidt was out there catching prostitutes and he had a meeting with some dude about security cameras or something. He grabbed a quick cup of coffee and headed back to his desk to find that the person he was meeting was already there. 

"Oh, uh, hey. I'm Officer Jenko and I'll be- Holy shit! Zack?" Coming around to sit down at his desk, Greg found himself smiling. Back when he'd been doing the school infiltration shit... back when he looked young enough to pass as a student... This kid had done so much for him. They'd gotten along well, but it had been too weird to try to keep up the friendship once everything got revealed. "Hey, dude. I just had a last name on the schedule. If I'd known it was you, I'd have brought back a cup of coffee for you, too. You want me to go back for it?"

Zack shook his head, his hair still a little shaggy. He looked older than he had 5 years ago, but Greg scoffed at himself. Of course Zack looked older. Greg knew he'd started getting a little gray peppered through his own hair. Zack cleared his throat. "I think I'll skip the coffee, thanks. I'm surprised to see you here. I've come by before, but I've never seen you. If I'd known, I would have asked for you, Brad. Only, wait. That's not your real name, right?"

"Nah. Greg Jenko." He started to put out his hand to shake Zack's, but ended up showing off the bandage on his hand. "This is why I'm here. Normally I'm out on the beat, but when you can't fire a gun in this precinct, you get desk duty. But what are you up to, man? It's something about security? I don't know. Nobody tells me anything."

"Greg." Zack smiled. "You don't look any more like a Greg than you did a Brad. Still, it's nice to see you again. After high school... Well, I went to school for computer science and realized that there wasn't any money in what I was doing, so I went back to what I was doing in high school with the cell phone stuff. I got into making my own security stuff and made apps to control it and just... I'm working with the police department here to test it out. So, what I've done before is to just bring in whatever I'm testing out and we try some different scenarios out and see how it works."

"Okay, cool. We can do that. What do you have today?" Greg looked Zack over. He didn't see any boxes, but he did notice that the kid had become, well, not a kid anymore.

Clearing his throat, Zack pushed his hair back behind his ears. "Well, um, what I've got today is something a little more complicated? I have it set up at my house. Could you come with me there? It's only about a mile and a half away."

Looking around for a moment, Greg thought it over. This _was_ his assignment, after all. If he could get paid to go to high school, he should be able to get paid to do his real job and maybe catch up with Zack a little on the side. "Sure, why the hell not? Am I following you or something?"

Zack shrugged with one shoulder. "You could ride with me, I suppose? With your hand like that, it must be uncomfortable to drive."

Greg laughed. "Y'know, I haven't tried yet? But I bet you're right. Lemme just let the chief know I'll be outta the office for a while and we'll head out." He smirked at Zack and gave him a little wave before heading to talk to the chief. It was a quick conversation that amounted to how he was useless in the office so he might as well leave for the rest of the day. He was used to it. He might've learned how to think things through, but that didn't mean he was actually useful when it came to files and all of that shit. Hell, Schmidt still did half of his paperwork for him, but since they were partners and the other man was a hell of a lot faster at it, Greg didn't feel too bad. It put a spring in his step, even, as he headed back toward Zack. He slapped his uninjured hand against the door frame and grinned. "Come on, man. I've got the rest of the day off so I'll just follow you home. That cool?"

"Should you drive with whatever medicine they gave you?" Despite the question, Zack stood and Greg sized him up even more. Taller. A little broader in the shoulders. 

With a snort, Greg led the way to the parking lot. "I got somethin' good, but it's startin' to wear off. I'll just take some more when I get to your place if that's cool."

There was a short pause, then Zack pulled even with him, nodding. "Yeah. I had planned for this to last for at least an hour, but I don't have anything important going on for the rest of the day so you're welcome to hang out for a while or whatever."

"Cool." Greg pointed to his own car, the fucking hybrid he'd bought because gas was too damn expensive on a cop salary, and said, "I'll be following you in that, so try not to lose me."

Zack gestured to the car in front of him; a BMW roadster. "In this, it wouldn't be difficult. Let me see your phone?"

Greg pulled it from his pocket and handed it over, smirking as he watched the other man's fingers fly across the touchscreen. "You haven't changed much, have you?"

One finger poised on the screen, Zack smiled. "Not as much as I'd thought." He tapped once more and handed the phone back. "There. Now your GPS is set to head to my place and I programmed in my phone number just in case."

"My fucking phone has GPS?" Greg stared at the screen for a moment. "Fuck me, man. I've had this thing for six months and I don't know how to work half the shit on it."

Zack smirked, laughing softly before reigning himself back in. "I can show you some of the things it does. I used to have one just like it. Anyway, um, follow the directions or try to follow me? Bring your phone with you when you get to my place and I'll at least show you how to turn off the GPS. It does kind of drain the battery."

Greg nodded and headed toward his car, shaking his head briefly at the soft sound of the engine starting up. It was easy to follow Zack, made even more so by the directions being stated by the phone, and it only took a few minutes to reach the other man's house, though Greg felt his jaw drop a little when he saw the place. It wasn't what he'd call a mansion, but it was a hell of a lot closer to it than the place he lived in. He pulled in behind Zack and got out of the car, making sure he had his pain meds and antibiotics in his jacket pocket. "Nice place, man," he said as he walked toward Zack.

Holding out his arms widespread, Zack grinned. "Yeah, it's pretty sweet. Come on in." He unlocked the door and gestured Greg inside.

"Shit. This is awesome. It makes my place look fucking terrible." Greg glanced over to the kitchen and groaned. "You've got a fucking pool?"

"And a hot tub." Zack pointed to the kitchen. "Can I get you something to drink?"

Greg's hand raised to pat his pocket. "Yeah. Gotta take these meds, man." A moment later, he had a glass of Coke sitting in front of him. "You're still a kid at heart, I guess, even though you've got all the toys now."

Shrugging, Zack looked around his kitchen. "I basically make toys now, only they're the type for guys who never grew out of liking spy stuff."

"Or police stuff?" Greg tossed his meds back, grimacing as he chased it with a long swallow of the soda. 

"Yeah, or that." Zack leaned against the counter and an expression came across his face that Greg couldn't put words to. "Anyway, let's head to the living room. That's where I've got the stuff set up." He led the way and Greg followed, still having no clue about what he was actually here to observe.

The coffee table looked like mahogany or some shit, so Greg held his glass in his hand for a moment as he looked around. "Dude, you got, like, a coaster or something?"

Zack shook his head. "No. Possessions are just possessions. If I get a water ring on the table from a friend visiting, well, then any time I see it I can remember that you were here."

"You act like I'd never come back here." Greg took another swallow of his drink and placed the glass on the corner of the coffee table before pulling one leg up on the other knee.

"I didn't know if you'd want to," Zack said, reaching up to run fingers through his hair. "I haven't seen you in years."

"Yeah, but that's 'cause things were just weird, man. I had to lie to you about shit, and then I was off running to colleges and shit to do the same thing, but now I'm back. So, if you want me to come over and hang out? Just let me know, man. I know you're probably not gonna be the type to watch the game on Sundays, but I know you're cool. Even if we just hop in the hot tub and talk about how our shitty days are, that's friendship, man."

Zack cleared his throat and looked down at his phone. "Yeah. That... It sounds nice." He looked up at Greg, his eyebrows raised slightly. "Oh, hey. Let me see your phone and I'll turn off the GPS for you."

Greg was happy to dig his good hand into his pocket, squirming around on the couch slightly in order to fish out the phone, handing it over. "Yeah, man, I just don't get this thing. It took me like three days to figure out how to change it back to English when my little cousin got a hold of it and switched it to German or some shit."

His fingers quick against the touch screen, Zack went through the motions of turning off the GPS. "Well, if you do need some lessons or you get something new, I'll be here to help show you what to do." He picked up his own phone again. "And I guess we should go ahead and do what you came here for."

"Whatever, man." Greg laughed and put his arm against the back of the couch, his bandaged hand sitting less than an inch from the back of Zack's head. "What is it, even?"

Zack held up his phone to show a display screen with a video feed and a ton of little buttons. "It's a surveillance system, only it's not stationary." He touched some of the various buttons and the image changed, making it obvious that the camera was actually moving locations rather than just tilting.

"Dude, what the hell?" Greg sat straight up as he realized that the video was of him. 

"Did you ever watch any of those things where the bugs used in a show or movie was made to actually look like a bug?" Zack stood up and walked over next to the television and plucked something from the wall, coming back to place it in Greg's hands. "It's super-thin for having a camera in it and I made a magnification system that rotates so you can zoom in without a big lens in the way or anything, and it has this cloaking technology built in so that it basically shows whatever's behind it. I can't really take credit for that part, though. I think some Canadians came up with it."

"Canadians, huh?" Greg turned the disc over in his hands, watching in awe as the outside changed to mimic the various colors and patterns around him. "This is so fucking cool, man." He paused, looking up. "I think you could sell this for porn, too. It could get up in there for the money shot without all those weird ass angles that look like you couldn't even put it in that way."

With a sudden laugh, Zack reached for the bug, taking it from Greg's hand in such a way that his fingers stroked against the other man's palm, then tossed it across the room.

"What the hell are you doing? Are you fucking high?" Greg stood up, his eyes already searching for the bug.

"It's fine." Zack showed his phone again to show that the display was still showing the room they were in. "It's pretty much indestructible. You could jump on it and it would be fine." He tapped the screen of his phone a few times and then turned back to Greg. "It also has a mode to search for faces so that if you're using it for safety purposes, it's more likely to actually get a shot of a culprit's face to use for identifying them, and you can see it's all in color. I'm working on making it night-vision ready, but I haven't managed to do it and keep it small like this. With that, it looks too much like a hockey puck."

Greg shook his head, grinning. "This is so awesome." He cleared his throat as he looked at Zack, though. "But, man, I gotta do my job here and say that if you're gonna market this thing and you don't wanna get in deep shit, you gotta make it traceable. Spy shit is cool and all, but if you're putting this out for just anyone to buy? People are shits and they like to do shit like sneak cameras into bathrooms to look at little girls peeing or something."

Zack nodded. "Yeah, I can see that. I guess I can add in some GPS." He smiled. "It's awesome to have you back in my life."

Greg blinked and reached his good hand up to rub against the back of his neck. "Dude, that's... It's, uh, it is nice."

"You know, maybe I should take this opportunity to be as brave as you are every day." Zack put his phone down on the table, staring at it for a long moment. 

"What could you do right now to be brave, dude?" Greg reached forward to grab his soda, draining half the glass before putting it back down.

With a soft laugh, Zack looked up. "I could kiss you."

"We aren't making that porno, though." Greg laughed, too, but then he noticed that the smile on Zack's face had fallen. "Are you serious, man?"

"Back in high school..." Zack placed his palms against his face, rubbing them against his eyes. "There was a point that I thought you were everything. I thought I'd gotten over that, but seeing you again? It just rushed back."

Greg downed the rest of his soda, licking his lips for a moment. "Well, you were kind of my prom date." He grinned. "Dude, I don't know if I feel the same thing or anything, but I'm not gonna hate you for feeling that way." He shrugged. "You did always seem to complicate the way I was feeling, though." He cleared his throat. "So, let's hang out more and we'll... we'll see how this shit goes."

Letting out a rush of breath, Zack sat back against the couch. "Well, that was an adrenaline rush. I guess I can see why you do exciting things all day."

"Paperwork isn't exciting at all." Greg grinned. "But this part of the job? Today? Hell, I ain't gonna complain. Not about you."

Zack smiled. "You know, we could go hop in the hot tub."

"I didn't bring any trunks, dude." Greg shook his head as he laughed. "Then again, we're both dudes. We can take it all off and it's cool, right?" He cleared his throat. "Nothing's gonna happen, but looking don't hurt, right?"

"No. Not at all." Zack stood up, his hands twitching slightly as they hung at his sides. "Want me to go grab some towels?"

Greg stood up, eyes taking in Zack from head to toe. "Yeah, man. Might as well." He reached to pick up his empty glass. "I don't know where we're going with this, man, but let's just go and see." He nudged Zack with the knuckles that surrounded the glass. "That cool with you?"

"Yeah." Zack took the glass from him, his fingers lingering against Greg's own for a moment. "That's cool." He held the glass between his hands for a moment. "So, I'll go get the towels and I'll meet you out back?"

"Yeah." Greg smiled. "I'm one-handed at the moment so maybe I'll just go ahead and work at getting undressed."

His cheeks flushing just a bit pink, Zack said, "Well, if I get out there and you need a hand..." He shrugged. "Like lab partners or something."

"Just so long as I'm not just another experiment, dude." Greg thrust his chin out in a cocky gesture. "I'll see you in a minute, man." He headed out toward the door that opened to the pool. Hell, he could blame it on the pain meds if he really needed to, but he was glad to see the kid. Man. And if maybe he was gay for the kid, well, that wasn't wrong anymore. And, really, it never had been. Some shit from his first stint in high school just liked to stick around in his head. But Zack? Well, he stuck around from the second time. And maybe that wasn't so bad, either.


End file.
